Impartial Informative Always

WHO CAN TAME CHINA – PART II

Having seen some of the historical facts and the leadership of China in Part I, in this part, we would consider the spectacular Chinese economic journey through the years.

TIMELINE : 1972-2008

On a fateful February 1972 morning, a meeting was organised in Beijing, between the USPresidentRichardNixon and ChairmanMaoTse–tung of China. The U.S. wanted to bring China out of isolation(till this time China was not recognized as a country by America) and prop it up, so as to undermine the USSR. That meeting changed the fate of China and the world. The cost of isolating USSR would be heavy for the world in general and the United States in particular(which we would see later). This was going to be a repeat of ‘MarshallPlan’, with a different connotation(Marshall Plan, also known as the European Recovery Program, was a U.S. program providing aid to Western Europe following the devastation of World War II – history.com). The US corporate greed, individual profiteers, and lack of understanding of the Chinese mind by American(and western) politicians would lead the world to a conflict(Thucydides’sTrap: The idea that the rise of a new power, as a competitor to an existing superpower, likely leads to the escalation of political tensions and war. The term was coined by Graham T. Allison, an American political scientist and is named after the 5th century Athenian historian Thucydides). The rise of China would have serious consequences if these prophecies come true(for more on Nixon-Mao meeting refer to book ‘Nixon and Mao: The Week That Changed The World’ by Margaret MacMillan).

Nothing much changed economically and strategically after that meeting, till the time Mao was alive. Baton was passed to Deng Xiaoping in 1976 after Mao’s death. Chinese Premier Deng Xiaoping started economic reforms in December 1978. At that time there were many hardliners in the party, who were opposing the reforms. The feeling was that the reforms would be reversed anytime soon, since they were going in the reverse direction of what the ‘Cultural Revolution’ was all about. Deng was aware of the discontent amongst peasants and he was also aware of the presage from the party hawks. He called his reforms “crossing the river by feeling the stones”.

While the world gives full credit of reforms to Deng, factually the reforms were pushed from bottoms up. The vast majority in the countryside was alienated during the ‘GreatLeapForward’ campaign of communist party from 1958-62. During this period Mao pushed the country from the agrarian to socialist society leading to ‘GreatChinaFamine’(The Great Chinese Famine, began in late 1958 and lasted until late 1961. Though ostensibly caused by drought and weather conditions, the Great Famine was undoubtedly worsened by the communist policies. The death toll, which has been obscured by the Chinese government was around 30 million). It’s a well-known fact that most of the reforms around the world were forced upon the leadership of any country due to circumstances, rather than some great strategy. China was fortunate enough to have good administrator in Deng during those testing times of 70s, when the discontent amongst the Chinese populace was at its peak. A modicum of an initiative by Deng and huge business opportunities presented by the U.S. government & corporate houses changed the fortunes of China and concomitant wealth for the countrymen(similar situation existed in India in 1990’s, wherein the adverse ‘Balance of Payment’ and foreign reserves crisis forced Indian leadership to go in for reforms and it was India’s good luck that well-known economist, Dr. Manmohan Singh was finance minister of India at that time).

In 1980 Deng took first concrete step towards reforms when he made Southern city of Shenzhen, the first ‘special economic zone’ ever, to experiment with more flexible market policies. In a matter of years, the city transformed from a fishing village into a manufacturing and shipping powerhouse(that is the period when Chinese per capita income surpassed India’s, however its GDP was still just 8% of US GDP: statisticstimes.com). Deng had no intention of making China a democracy, neither he had any intention of loosening grip over Chinese people, so he dismissed Hu Yaobang in 1987, the reformist Communist Party chief who was seen as too liberal for his actions against protesting pro-democracy students. Year of 1990 saw the opening of the Shanghai Stock Exchange, first ever stock market in Communist China. Yuan was made convertible on the current account, enabling the free flow of money for imports and exports in 1996. Deng died in February 1997 and Jiang Zemin took over as his successor. Under Zemin’s watch, in 1998, China kicked off a $500 billion bailout of its banking sector, rescuing them from a legacy of bad, often politically directed, loans made in the early years of reform. China joined the World Trade Organization in November 2001 opening floodgates of opportunities. China’s nominal GDP surpassed that of Italy in 2000, France in 2005, the United Kingdom in 2006 and that of Germany in 2007, before overtaking Japan in 2010. In 2008, Beijing hosted a hugely successful Summer Olympic Games, illustrating China’s arrival on the world stage. And the story goes on…

HOW DID IT ALL HAPPEN

“Never attempt to win by force what can be won by deception.”
― Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince

One has to grant it to Chinese that they knew from the beginning how to exploit capitalism. Once they drew the ‘hundred years plan’ to revive past glory, they got after it with religious fervor. They identified very early during the reforms, the core issues of banking weakness in their system. Today China has the top four biggest banks of the world: Industrial and Commercial Bank of China($4 trillion), China Construction Bank($3.4 trillion), Agriculture Bank of China($3.24 trillion) and Bank of China($2.99 trillion). JP Morgan Chase keeps fluctuating between 6th and 7th spot, in the world ranking.

There is one leviathan of an organization which is not part of the above-mentioned list. The organization away from public scrutiny is called the ChinaDevelopmentBank(CDB). This bank dwarfs all other banks put together. Since the bank is not listed, its worth is not well known but its might is. CDB calls shots in China and even helps out four big banks to clean up their slate in times of trouble. CDB bosses knew, using banks to finance infrastructure projects would improve China’s credit culture and capital market returns rather than funding everything through the budget(which was the weaknesses of the Eastern Block). They also knew that the projects financed by banks would create markets, because in a country moving from communism to capitalism there often were none. CDB also hired big and respectable names of the world as part of its ”International Advisory Council”. Former AIG head, Hank Greenberg, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, economist Fred Bergsten and former Bank of Israel Governor Frenkel were some of the prominent names on their payroll. This gave credibility to CDB and it’s opaque transactions, what it did behind closed doors.

Four pillars of Chinese success are Chinese Communist Party embracing Capitalism, China Development Bank, the high rate of household savings, and Chinese farming land. If the communist party is the God in China, CDB is the Prophet. With their blessings, Chinese companies could achieve what Nikita Khrushchev(Nikita Khrushchev led the Soviet Union during the height of the Cold War, serving as premier from 1958 to 1964) could only dream of: “burytheirwesterncompetitions”. During the first three decades of reforms, almost every person in China became ‘Homo Economicus’ and country could achieve 9-10% of consistent growth. Urbanization started at such a pace that by 2011 China became predominantly urban country, for the first time in the 5000 years of its history.

LGFV: As per Henry Sanderson who wrote a bestseller ‘China’s Superbank’, CBD invented LGFV(Local Government Financing Vehicle) and the secret sauce of ”Wuhu Model”. The LGFV mechanism allows local governments to set up companies that borrow loans from the CDB and other banks, using land as collateral. The authorities pay the interest on their loans by selling or leasing the same land. Therefore the system depends on high land values and on the revenue they generate. The risks for this type of loan could increase if the economy, or the real estate market experience, a slowdown. Locals call LGFV: “Engine of inequality”.

‘WuhuModel’: It got its name from Wuhu which is a prefecture-level city in southeastern Anhui province in China. ‘Wuhu Model’ was the first of its kind of experiment. Local government with the helping hand from CDB created a virtuous cycle. They started public works like roads and infrastructure which boosted land prices and in turn boosted home prices. Local government forced farmers to sell their land at just 6-8% of the eventual price of that land. Thereafter they built highways, stadiums and such public utility facilities, boosting land prices around those areas. Local governments could sell land acquired from farmers at 10-15 times the acquisition cost to companies(companies again mostly owned by the local governments) boosting their own income. With the help of this virtuous cycle, CDB pushed ’Wuhu Construction’ from a 319 million yuan company to a 21.4 billion yuan company in a short span of time.

Later on, Wuhu model was applied nationwide, and at least 50 million farmers lost their land to the cities, and 60 million more would be uprooted in next two decades as China’s urbanization gathers momentum. Over 60% of large-scale protests in China are land-related(yes they allow protests in China within a rigid boundary). It is a reversal of the core principles of the Communist revolution where Mao redistributed land from rich to peasants.

Successive governments followed GeorgeOrwell’s quote from the book ’1984’- “Powerisintearinghumanmindtopiecesandputtingthemtogetheragaininnewshapesofyourownchoosing”, to the core. Chinese were first made to believe that ‘Communism’ is good for them and then they were made to believe that ‘Socialism with Chinese Characteristic’ is good for them and finally ‘Public Benefit with Capital Market Finance’ was put in their head. Chinese populace is very industrious and they deserve to get their due in the world order. However Chinese leadership is equally Machiavellian and want to deal with their populace on their own terms.

PRESENT DAY

The top five economies of the world in 2018 as per ‘Forbes’ magazine are the USA, China, Japan, Germany, and the UK, however, if economists are to be believed then by 2030 this list would undergo a sea change. The list would read something like this: China, USA, India, Japan, and Indonesia. Even if the economic numbers have been cooked up by China, listed below are some of the indicators which cannot be hidden away from public scrutiny and examination.

Through history, special attention has been paid to the study of the relationship between the energy use of a country and its level of development. In the current context of globalization, the energy used by a country is not anymore a suitable indicator for measuring the total energy requirements associated with its level of development, however, it is still a good indicator. Since 2011, China has consumed more coal than the rest of the world combined. Over the last decade, China’s investment in renewableenergy and naturalgas has surged. In 2017, almost half of global renewable energy investment came from China, totaling $125.9 billion. By 2015, China accounted for one-third of global wind–energy capacity. China is now home to two-thirds of the world’s solar–production capacity. Since 2017, China has trailed only to France and the United States in terms of nuclearenergy generation. China’s demand for crudeoil similarly outpaces its domestic production. Since 1993, China has been a net importer of crude oil, and in 2017 it surpassed the United States as the largest importer in the world(source: csis.org). China has shown a similar voracious appetite for metals and minerals, to sustain its industries.

Business magazine Fortune published its latest world’s 500 largest companies list, or Global500 of 2018, in which China has 120 companies in the list, just behind the US, 126 companies, and Japan, 52 companies. India has only 7 companies in that list. There is another list called ForbesGlobal2000. This is an annual ranking of the top 2,000 public companies in the world by Forbes magazine. The ranking is based on a mix of four metrics: sales, profit, assets and market value. In the top 100 comprises in this list China has 18, the U.S. 30, Japan8 and India has only 1 company. In the top 10 list, China and the United States have 5 companies each, with China leading the pack. China is catching up with the U.S. at neck-breaking speed, and in the areas where is not able to do so, it is buying them out(U.S. semiconductor manufacturing equipment company Akrion Systems was acquired by Beijing-based Naura Microelectronics Equipment Company and insurer Genworth Financial, Inc by China Oceanwide Holdings Group).

Chinese companies have shown phenomenal growth in earnings. The ForbesGlobalGrowthChampions List has 8Chinese companies out of the top10. Chinese real estate developer Greenland Holding Group which saw $44.8 billion in sales and $1.5 billion in profit last year, tops the list. In total, the 500 largest companies in China generated more than the US$5.9 trillion in revenue in 2017 – up 18.2% compared to last year – and US$0.5 trillion in profit, which is an increase of 24.2% year-on-year.

China has by far the largest foreigncurrencyreserves with over two and a half times more than the second largest reserve holder, Japan. When China and Hong Kong reserves are considered together, the total is $3.6 trillion. India is at number eight with forex reserves of $403.7 billion. The United States had foreign currency reserves of $123.5 billion and the United Kingdom, which did not make the top ten list, had $187.4 billion in foreign reserves as of August 2018(source: investopedia.com).

This omnipotent economic growth has emboldened China, and it has started working on its ’Tower of Babel”, threatening the present world order. With China at the top, this wouldn’t be a dystopian world. Because the labyrinthine path to the halcyon Chinese world has many pitfalls. Obscurantism is mantra of Chinese dispensation. Everything is opaque in that country, including their economy. In his book ‘China’s Great Wall of Debt’ Dinny McMahon illustrates how this facade of portentous economic progression might come crashing down under its own weight, one day.

Would China rule the world one day? Who is going to stop it, if at all? What are the pitfalls in its economy and society? We shall consider all that in the next part.

Sandeep, congratulations once again for such a brilliant narrative of the growth of China and the role of America. It’s indeed a result of great research work by you and putting together the key issues in few paragraphs. I can see a bright strategist in you and wish you very best. Bravo Zulu.

Very nice read. Will wait for next part. In India one thing is being experienced in the industrial sector that the customers are now asking to tell suppliers other than Chinese suppliers. They have problem even to take it from Taiwan instead. This mind set , perception and non faith is going to be tumbling block for China in India though at a very slow pace. On the same note it is to be understood thst China will not have war with India as China will loose its business from India on sentimental ground.

Sandeep, congratulations once again for such a brilliant narrative of the growth of China and the role of America. It’s indeed a result of great research work by you and putting together the key issues in few paragraphs. I can see a bright strategist in you and wish you very best. Bravo Zulu.

Economics is not my forte however I do not believe in this rags to riches story. Though all the visible clues say otherwise, as brought out by you, there has to be a catch somewhere. The opaqueness of the Chinese society makes it all the more difficult to understand. Anyway all the tidbits that we keep getting here and there have been very nicely compiled and logically explained. As one of your readers wrote, it gets more and more interesting. Whether the Dragon rules or falls under it’s own weight is anybody’s guess. Waiting to hear what you have to say.

Sandy, as with the last article, very well put together and eminently readable. Great work! Would like to share some points to ponder for follow up articles……
1. Cyclicle nature of civilisations and influence. How does it matter if China rises? How will that effect the world?
2. The nature of present day connectivity and how sharing of thoughts at light speed influences culture?
3. Inherent shortcomings of an authoritarian state with respect to innovation and creativity.
4. Last but not the least, it might be a good idea to examine how they managed the sudden economic rise. Currency, debt both internal and external, and most importantly the influence of public sentiment on economy via investments.

Its a connected world, and currently they are as liable to rise to number one as to bring the world down with them

Well written article. However, as in any other country which is growing rapidly, there will be tremendous inequalities building up. How the country manages these without violence needs to be seen. Another most pertinent issue is that China, more than at any other time in history, is too dependent on the rest of the world to maintain its trade surplus.

Very well articulated Sandomina…it’s evident that you have spent a lot of time in research and are putting facts with supporting figures which makes it very authentic and very interesting to read…I do hope you have messages in the concluding part for what India needs to do to catch up. Inspite of having a clear advantage of having more English speaking people than other economies we are way behind them.

Superbly written Sandy. Their belt road initiative, African/ third world countries colonisation are significant steps to expanding their footprint, power and economic reach . Looking forward to the next part.

Sandip, congrats for a well researched article and thanks for giving us insight into China’s economic might.
May I request you to throw some light on how economic rise of China will affect India being a neighbor and a competitor.
China is also investing heavily in Pakistan, how will this shape in to future bilateral relations.
Is it that China is over stretching itself in too many initiatives in Pakistan and Africa or they are well balanced to support China’s growing economy.

It is a superlative effort, documenting thoughts on one of the most complex and opaque topics ‘rise of China’. Kudos to your efforts at creating a simplified narrative for common people like us. India too provided opportunities to China through Nehruvian policies that allowed her to divert attention from internal strife during the Great Leap leading to the 1962 Indo-China War. We also gifted them the permanent seat at UN and nuclear status, something that contributes greatly albeit indirectly to China’s economic prosperity. China had been left out of the the world economic high table, they were not admitted to the IMF and the World Bank, both dominated by the westerners. The creation AIIB is the Chinese counter and BRI is the economic vehicle to create conditions for USA to agree to a G2 concept (a bipolar world dominated by USA – China), a transition of power without the normally associated war in a power struggle. Keep Blogging……. looking forward to your final piece on China

Another wonderful perspective about how China got it going in their favour and progressed leaps and bounds.
They have surprised many as they have had an upper hand in almost all spheres because of the way they plan and negotiate.
However the world (countries that matter)now read them better and are prepared to extract better terms.
I feel that the Chinese over ambition and progress will be on a more realistic trajectory in the coming years.
We can already see the corrections taking place.

Thanks, Amar. Well said. If the unchallenged rise of China has to be stopped then somehow it has to be conveyed to the western corporations. The unbridled greed of Western corporations is the main reason behind this delay in the course correction.

Sandeep thank you for an excellent and informative write-up. As you said, “If the communist party is the God in China, CDB is the Prophet” and this is the essence of strong leadership provided during the rough road of growth. No doubt that “opaqueness” in govt vehicles/systems have given them the advantages of being the Communist Party-ruled country and it is impossible the pace of growth to achieve under the democratic setup like in India. Once again, thank you for an elucidative article on the subject and l am looking forward to the next one.

Yes, Ramakrishnan, what you are saying is absolutely correct. The strong and centralized leadership has given China an edge, however, we will see in the coming parts, how this same strong leadership would work against China in the times to come.

You have done a lot of research on China. I am not an expert on China. So my comments are based on my limited knowledge.

In fact, I gained more knowledge through your writings. Thanks.

Coming to the series…

Your style of writing is impressive. You have even quoted sources and have systematically analysed things…nice.

I will not go into part 1 and 2. Because the facts brought out by you and the analyses thereon by you are indisputable and excellent..👏

Part 3 was the most important one wherein you had drawn conclusions..

In part 3, you have brought out how manipulative the Chinese have been..and still are..

Now the question is… Who will tame China?

As I understand, the Chinese are playing a game of chess involving all the major global players.

At the global level, willy nilly the US, Japan, Russia, India etc have become responders because they have to make their moves in response to Chinese moves… we all are in this game. We have no other choice but to respond keeping one’s individual national interests in mind.
The grand strategy of China in this game is also the same…i.e., to make all the players in a way, stakeholders..so that the Chinese gains or losses affect all…

China is deeply ingrained into all the global systems whether it is military, economic or world financial systems. Therefore, we can’t treat China as any sundry country at the global level. As brought out by you rightly, if it had been any other country, the reactions from the US or Russia would have been different.. like severe sanctions imposed to cripple the country’s economy etc.. but China is too big a player..

I think China had already grown too big to be tamed by anybody. The Chinese have been wisely making their moves since 1990s..
During their initial period of economic struggle, they ensured that the major economies are made the stakeholders in their progress.. including the US. Once their initial economic objectives were achieved, they concentrated on strengthening their military.

All these years,
major powers miscalculated the Chinese moves and their potential to hold the world to ransom…All of them continued to pursue their own national goals.. obviously..

Even in the African continent, the Chinese knew how to manipulate the corrupt politicians, dictators and businessmen to establish themselves..

I am only repeating what you have already explained..You know all these things…

My sense is, since they are firmly rooted all over the world, they have now become major part of the global systems. Any major destabilization of China in any manner will lead to catastrophic global ramifications.. because the Chinese have checkmated all of us. The game is over.

I think now there are no moves left for anyone to tame China. We can now only name and shame China and create a world opinion against its illegitimate activities..

I think, we all are only trying to extend the culmination point by creating economic, military and financial hurdles for the Chinese. If we push China too hard against the wall..it will react aggresively even if it brings peril to the whole world..so we can’t credibly punish China without global sufferings..

I don’t see any credible deterrence which can work at this stage… Chinese also know that… they can’t be pushed to the edge by anyone.. without the risk of a major global catastrophe..

So.my persnal observation is, trying to tame China at this stage, is like trying to tame a dinausaur.

Sorry for the long comment..
My idea was to bring out various perspectives…so that we all think for alternatives..

Thanks sandy..😊 for an educative and engaging series. I have learnt many facts and statistics about China From your series..
Congratulations..well done..👍👍🙏🙏🙏

Dostoevsky believed that the beauty will save the world, but I am sure that the greed and human stupidity will destroy it before the beauty gets a chance to wake up this indolent and indifferent humanity.